I was standing knee deep in a pile of poop. At least I think it was poop. It was kind of like really thick mud, but it smelled much, much worse. Looking around I saw Bjorn climb out of his own pile, and everyone else appear in piles made just for them. It actually looked like the piles were specifically sized for everyone. Lily had a short pile, Marcus had a medium one, and Scria and Bjorn had large piles. If Lily had ended up in Bjorn's pile, she would've been burried. Shuddering at that thought I pushed my way out of my pile and went to where Bjorn was pulling Lily out of her pile.

"Yo B, why'd ya pick the shitty dungeon?" Scria looked a bit upset.

"It was the closest? And the cheapest one. All the good dungeons are secrets, and buying locations is very expensive."

"Breath of Wind" Marcus cast a spell that immediately removed the horrible smell, "Clense, you're welcome everyone. Marcus the Magnificent is here to take care of all your laundering needs. So never fear and follow our brave Bjorn into the depths of the Abyss, for I shall keep your air fresh and your hair perfect."

He got a few chuckles from that, but I could tell everyone was relieved to have fresh air, and poop free clothes. Before we went any further, Bjorn, Scria, and Marcus started buffing themselves. Bjorn looked like his skin got tougher, I could almost hear a drum beat near Scria, and Marcus looked kind of blurry.

"Alright, Bwyd you scout out ahead, otherwise we'll use the same formation that we used in the woods. For those of you who don't know, most of the system functions do not work in dungeons, so we'll have to comunicate without sending messages. Any questions?"

"If I'm scouting, what should I do if I find a fork in the cave?"

Marcus answered, "Pick it up, unless its cursed or a trap." Lily giggled (in bells), but everyone else sighed or rolled their eyes.

"Marcus. She's asking a serious question, we don't need jokes. Either wait for the rest of us or leave a mark so we know what way you went."

"Oh, and Lily, if I'm sneaking will your lights mess that up?"

"No, they're basically as visible as you are, so if your invisible they are too. They're basically like equipment, but not."

"Alright, I'm ready. Cloak of Shadows."

I started walking down the tunnel as Bjorn called to me, "We'll wait about a minute then start following you, if you see anything dangerous get back to us as quickly as possible."

The tunnel was very smooth. The bottom was flat, but the rest of it was round, almost like someone made a perfectly round tunnel, then poured cement in the bottom of it to make a flat walking surface. There was also a trough down the middle of it that had some unpleasent looking liquid in it, and probably smelled really bad. It was dark, but I could see pretty well, and with my spell I was pretty sure I'd see anthing before it saw me.

I walked down the tunnel for a while before it openned up into a room. It wasn't a very big room, but there was a large rat sitting in the middle of it. The walls were all flat, but the ceiling was a dome, and the trough went straight through the middle of it and out a tunnel on the other side. I started to sneak into the room, but as soon as I stepped in the rat started sniffing the air. I froze for a moment, then decided to try attacking the rat. I figured I could always escape if I really needed to. And besides, I was a dragon. How could I be afraid of a little rat. A little rat that was about the same size as me, but nothing compared to my mother, so it was still small. At least that's what I tried to tell myself. Sadly my thoughts were interrupted when the rat stopped sniffing and lunged at me.

Shadow Step

I managed to get out of the way by teleporting to the other side of the room.

Curse of Molasses

The rat slowly turned around to look in my direction, then it slowly ran towards me. I had so much time I decided to try all my attack spells, so I started with fire.

Firebolt, Fireball, Firewall, Burn

The rat was dead before it got to me, I think it might have died around the time I cast Firewall, but I was mostly casting as many spells as I could to keep it from getting to me. Even if it was a bit of overkill, I realized I killed my first creature, it was kind of an interesting feeling. I had never killed anything before, and even though this was a game it seemed real enough. The rat was still smoking a little, and I could feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins. It just happened so quickly, and now my stomach started grumbling. Which was probably becuase the cooked rat smell kind of good, and my Firewall was still burning. Before I could even think about eating the rat, it started to disappear in little motes of light and the smell of cooked meat went with it.

"Hey Bwyd, you around?" Bjorn yelled from the other side of the Firewall.

"Yeah I'm just over here, I fought a giant rat. I think I used a bit too much power."

I heard bell laughter, "Do not worry about that, we're just glad you are alright."

At that point the Firewall ended and I saw everybody on the other side, mostly smiling.

Bjorn wasn't really smiling, he was serious looking, "Congratulations Bwyd, you didn't die, but you should have let us know there was a monster, so we could have fought it together."

"B, don't be stuck up. If she wants kills, let 'er have em. Besides, she looks great." Scria gave me a few thumbs up.

"Fine, if you can take care of weak mobs, go ahead, but how much mana did you use Bwyd?"

"Um, how do I check?"

I got incredulous looks from everyone, even Marcus but he was the first to recover, "So, just like your stats you can will to see your mana, the system will tell you. Also, you regenerate 1/10 of your Willpower in mana every minute, unless you meditate then it increases."

I willed my mana to be shown.

Alert

Mana 22/37

"I have twenty-two out of thirty-seven, so I should be good. I could kill a couple more rats and I don't even need to use as much as I did with the first one." I felt a little upset that they didn't think I could take care of myself.

Bjorn still seemed shocked, "Bwyd, how do you have so much mana? You only have 20 for your power rating. You should only have like twenty."

Marcus whistled, "Guys, her power went up when she got a class. It's over ninety. Ninety-five to be exact."

There was an awkward pause as everyone checked to see my power in whatever part of the system they used to see it, then Scria burst out laughing.

"B's the baby, big baby. Half the power of Bwyd." She could barely talk through the laughter.

Bjorn was starting to look irritated, so I decided to keep scouting, "I'm going to keep going, see you guys later."

I recast Cloak of Shadows and headed down the tunnel before anyone could stop me.